Author Topic: WW3  (Read 334525 times)

Crafty_Dog

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Re: WW3
« Reply #750 on: March 23, 2023, 06:43:14 PM »
Remember the Chinese testing launching hypersonics from , , , balloons?

ccp

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Re: WW3
« Reply #751 on: March 24, 2023, 06:03:55 AM »
I tried to search on the Russian hypersonics
and get really sparse very confusing ambiguous results

the source for article posted by GM

is a bit of a character according to wikipedia ( which of course itself is a bit of source I will often take with grain of salt):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Davor_Domazet-Lo%C5%A1o

In addition why would a Croatian admiral be any more privy to top secret Russian or US intelligence ?


G M

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Re: WW3
« Reply #752 on: March 24, 2023, 06:28:23 AM »
I tried to search on the Russian hypersonics
and get really sparse very confusing ambiguous results

the source for article posted by GM

is a bit of a character according to wikipedia ( which of course itself is a bit of source I will often take with grain of salt):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Davor_Domazet-Lo%C5%A1o

In addition why would a Croatian admiral be any more privy to top secret Russian or US intelligence ?

I think he's more willing to tell the truth.

ccp

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Re: WW3
« Reply #753 on: March 24, 2023, 06:36:09 AM »
that is what you want to believe since what he is saying what you believe
but I take him with a grain of salt

as I do not know the truth

I don't know who or what to believe and that includes him

but again why do you choose  believe him?
do you think he has more privy/credibility  as some guy from Croatia?
Does Croatia have hypersonics - why would he be so expert in the technology
Why would he be so expert in the military tech that might counter hypersonics ?

maybe he does know but I have not read anything to explain how he knows







G M

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Re: WW3
« Reply #754 on: March 24, 2023, 06:44:40 AM »
that is what you want to believe since what he is saying what you believe
but I take him with a grain of salt

as I do not know the truth

I don't know who or what to believe and that includes him

but again why do you choose  believe him?
do you think he has more privy/credibility  as some guy from Croatia?
Does Croatia have hypersonics - why would he be so expert in the technology
Why would he be so expert in the military tech that might counter hypersonics ?

maybe he does know but I have not read anything to explain how he knows

https://news.usni.org/2021/06/14/mda-u-s-aircraft-carriers-now-at-risk-from-hypersonic-missiles

https://www.nationaldefensemagazine.org/articles/2019/3/22/incoming-can-aircraft-carriers-survive-hypersonic-weapons

https://nationalinterest.org/blog/reboot/are-hypersonic-missiles-ultimate-threat-aircraft-carriers-186298

G M

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G M

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Re: WW3
« Reply #756 on: March 24, 2023, 06:49:52 AM »

ccp

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Re: WW3
« Reply #757 on: March 24, 2023, 07:04:15 AM »
as for the Russian Kinzhal

I pulled up rather mixed and not glowing reports of its effectiveness
some apparently have been used in Ukraine but I have not seen any reports of their effectiveness

and does not seem likely that our best defenses are in Ukraine so not know if they would work against us

I see speeds up to Mach 10 in some places others at Mach 3 or so
All I CAN say is I hope we have the intelligence that leads our military closer to the truth

As for CCP missiles I cannot make clear heads or tails of them.





G M

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Imagine if China flooded our skies with cheap balloon decoys
« Reply #759 on: March 24, 2023, 07:47:56 AM »
Remember the Chinese testing launching hypersonics from , , , balloons?

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/china-sees-balloon-launched-drone-swarms-in-its-future

Balloons are cheap, as are cardboard boxes set up to have the same radar profile.

How many Sidewinders do we have in inventory? How fast can we produce them? Good thing we can print endless dollars!
« Last Edit: March 24, 2023, 07:51:57 AM by G M »

ccp

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Re: WW3
« Reply #760 on: March 24, 2023, 10:08:11 AM »



Crafty_Dog

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Re: WW3
« Reply #763 on: March 27, 2023, 07:08:11 AM »
Gen Keane concurs on the status of our Navy, especially in the the South China Sea.


Crafty_Dog

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What the US can do to prepare for war with China
« Reply #765 on: March 28, 2023, 06:19:40 PM »
What the U.S. Can Do to Prepare for a War With China
The military’s problem isn’t technological. It’s a strategy designed only for low-intensity conflict.
By Seth Cropsey
March 28, 2023 6:23 pm ET


The U.S. is unprepared for an impending great-power conflict. That’s widely understood, but most commentary on American military preparedness misses three critical points: the time horizon for a conflict with China, the logistical challenges of building and sustaining American military power, and the industrial difficulties of replenishing and expanding current stockpiles. A war with Beijing wouldn’t be decided primarily with high-end weapons systems but with the traditional elements of military power.


The threats to global stability and the US homeland are growing. How will the war in Ukraine end? Can China and the US develop a less combative relationship? Join historian and Journal columnist Walter Russell Mead and editorial page editor Paul Gigot for an interactive conversation on the threats to US security.


A new cold war has begun. At its heart is a fundamental disagreement between the U.S. and China over the structure of Asian security considerations. The original Cold War’s antagonism stemmed from Soviet insistence that Washington remove itself from Europe and Eurasia more broadly. China’s strategic effort to deny U.S. forces access to international waters where a naval conflict could occur, its increasing numbers of military bases around the world, and its growing ability to interrupt logistic communications with America’s Indo-Pacific allies demonstrate that Beijing has the same ambition today. Just as Soviet Russia sought to destroy the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and thereby eliminate U.S. political engagement in Western Europe, communist China now seeks to capture Taiwan and to fragment the U.S. alliance system in Asia.

China has something against which to measure its policy that the Soviets never had: history. Beijing has studied Moscow’s Cold War mistakes, notably the tendency among Soviet strategists to wait patiently until their military power exceeded that of the U.S. This never occurred, primarily because the West engaged in a massive military expansion in the 1980s that nullified Soviet gains over the preceding two decades.

The Chinese aren’t going to wait patiently. They are prepared to capitalize on an apparent shift in their favor. China enjoys a growing advantage in geographic position, fleet size and missile numbers. In Xi Jinping, it also has a leader willing to use force to achieve political objectives. China stands a better chance now than it ever has of defeating the U.S. and its allies in a major war. The U.S. should expect an attack on Taiwan within this decade, perhaps as soon as 2025.


The imminence of conflict means the U.S. must consider how it would fight with the military as currently constituted. In some cases that would mean repurposing equipment and hardware for new uses. In others it would require reconceiving the service branches’ approaches to war fighting. The legacy systems of the U.S. military—fighter planes, heavy bombers, destroyers and aircraft carriers—would be crucial in a major Indo-Pacific war. The immediate question isn’t how to replace these platforms, but rather how to amplify their effectiveness.

America’s traditional forces aren’t particularly vulnerable or outdated, at least intrinsically. The aircraft carrier has always fought as a system—it needs fighter and strike aircraft that can reach targets without exposing the ship to attack, and an escort screen of smaller ships that can shoot down enemy missiles. The American surface fleet, if used for strike operations, needs long-range missiles to hit the infrastructure that supports the Chinese military.

But the nuts and bolts of American military power are lacking. Most glaring, the U.S. has no logistical capacity to support a major-power war. The military cargo fleet is designed for limited contingencies. According to the Government Accountability Office, ships in the reserve fleet are on average more than 40 years old and in poor repair. According to a 2020 Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments analysis, there simply wouldn’t be enough merchant mariners to crew American ships in a major logistical effort. Even during the Gulf and Iraq wars, the U.S. contracted for significant added merchant capacity. Most ships that call at U.S. ports are foreign-flagged or foreign-crewed, if not both. This means that once a conflict begins, Washington can’t rely on them. Without an effective link between American forces in the Indo-Pacific and materiel depots in the continental U.S., a fight will be hard to sustain.

Some commentators have claimed that aid to Ukraine has run down American stockpiles for the defense of Taiwan. That isn’t right. What we’ve been sending to Ukraine is radically different from what would be required in a war over Taiwan and, critically, is built in entirely different locations and with entirely different processes. The real problem stems from Washington’s decision to “rationalize” the defense industrial base after the Cold War, allowing a healthy ecosystem of defense producers to shrink to a handful of corporations. These companies operate far better than their predecessors bureaucratically but can’t deliver results rapidly. Unless the U.S. can scale up production of the weapons it will need in the Indo-Pacific—hypersonics, cruise and ballistic missiles, and short-range antiship weapons—it would lose a fight for Taiwan in weeks.

This is the core issue. The U.S. military isn’t behind the curve in some grand transformation in warfare. It simply can’t employ the combat tools it has so carefully cultivated over the past 30 to 50 years because it has spent that time preparing to fight low-intensity wars, not a major strategic contest with a peer. If stagnation continues, deterrence will fail. So will the prospects for American victory in any major-power conflict.

Mr. Cropsey is founder and president of the Yorktown Institute. He served as a naval officer and as deputy undersecretary of the Navy and is author of “Mayday” and “Seablindness.”

G M

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ccp

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good point
« Reply #767 on: April 06, 2023, 07:47:13 AM »
de dollarization

what does this mean

who funds the debt - if countries start buying rupees or yuan
then what happens to our debt financing?

The public owns the majority of it but then its value for the public drops :

https://www.thebalancemoney.com/who-owns-the-u-s-national-debt-3306124

sounds like a viscous cycle of decline possible

on other hand China already past its peak economic growth so yuan may not become so attractive see El-Erian on in Barron's ( I can't post as I don't subscribe to barrons though oddly I was able to read the article in I phone news )

Crafty_Dog

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Re: WW3
« Reply #768 on: April 07, 2023, 10:03:08 AM »


"sounds like a viscous (sic) cycle of decline possible"

YES!!!



ccp

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Re: WW3
« Reply #771 on: April 12, 2023, 11:03:14 AM »
"Seymour Hersh on Biden’s Ukraine Corruption Quagmire: “This is Not Just Bad Leadership. There is None.”

And astonishingly the MSM is totally silent.

Remember when in Vietnam they were in the faces of politicians every single minute of every day .

Today , because we have a Democrat in power - nothing .


Crafty_Dog

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ET: Looks like we would lose a war with China
« Reply #772 on: April 13, 2023, 08:34:49 AM »
China is Preparing for War; Is the US Ready? (theepochtimes.com)
Andrew Thornebrooke
By Andrew Thornebrooke
April 12, 2023Updated: April 12, 2023
biggersmaller Print


News Analysis

The ammunition is running low, casualties are immense, medicine and other critical supplies have not come for weeks, and a nuclear attack on the American homeland is imminent.

It is a dramatic scene, more closely resembling a Hollywood drama than any war that the United States has actually fought in the last half-century. It is nevertheless what many expect a war between the United States and communist China could look like this decade.

Both the United States and China are investing record-breaking sums in building up their military capabilities. Leadership on both sides increasingly appears to consider such a conflict as inevitable, despite rhetoric to the contrary.

The cause for that mutual enmity is the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) claim that democratic Taiwan belongs to China, and CCP leader Xi Jinping’s desire to force that unification within a few years’ time.

Xi has ordered the regime’s military wing to prepare for war, and to be ready to launch an invasion of Taiwan by 2027.

Preparing for what would be history’s most ambitious amphibious assault is not the same as actually launching it. But, should the worst occur, the Biden administration or its successor will have to decide either to join the fray, or to let Taiwan stand on its own and fight for its freedom.

Before U.S. leadership decides on that question, however, it must answer another, more foundational one: Can the United States win a war with China?

‘The Window of Maximum Danger’
Rep. Mike Gallagher (R-Wisc.) is more invested in the new cold war between the United States and China than most.

Tasked with leading Congress’ new House Select Committee on Strategic Competition with the CCP, he is one of the few movers and shakers in the legislative branch directly engaged in developing an action plan to defend the American people, its economy, and values from CCP aggression.

For him, Russia’s ongoing conquest of Ukraine, and the United States’ failure to deter it, contain all the lessons necessary to prepare for what comes next in Taiwan.

“If we don’t learn the right lessons from the failure of deterrence in Ukraine, authoritarian aggression and the CCP’s malign influence will spread to the Indo-Pacific, and our New Cold War with the Chinese Communist Party could quickly become hot,” Gallagher told The Epoch Times.

“To prevent this, we have to act with a sense of urgency and do everything we can to deter a CCP invasion of Taiwan.”

That plan is much the same as it has been since 1979, when the United States passed the Taiwan Relations Act and agreed to provide the island with the arms necessary to maintain its self-defense.

The strategic landscape 44 years ago was something altogether different, however, and the number of weapons and systems that Taiwan now requires to hold the CCP at threat are immense.

The way Gallagher sees it, neither Taiwan nor the United States is prepared for the possibility of war with China.

Speaking back in November of 2021, Gallagher warned that, “if we went to war in the Taiwan Strait tomorrow, we’d probably lose.”

Gallagher is careful now to avoid similar doomspeak but, when asked if he still agreed with that assessment, his optimism for the United States’ performance in a war with China is palpably limited.

“If the Chinese Communist Party invaded Taiwan today, we would not be well positioned to defend our friend, our interests, or American values in the Indo-Pacific,” Gallagher says.

The United States must choose, he believes, to arm Taiwan to the teeth now or come to Taiwan’s aid at a much greater cost later.

Either way, the choices the United States makes now, he says, will largely determine the conditions of victory and defeat at a later date. To that end, Congress must unite to arm Taiwan and systematically counter the CCP’s malign influence at every opportunity.

“We are in the window of maximum danger,” Gallagher says, “and if we are going to ensure that it’s the U.S.—not the CCP—writing the rules of the 21st century, we need to unite in overwhelming bipartisan fashion to combat CCP aggression.”

Taiwan Holds Defence Drills
Taiwan’s armed forces hold two days of routine drills to show combat readiness ahead of Lunar New Year holidays at a military base in Kaohsiung, Taiwan, on Jan. 12, 2023. (Annabelle Chih/Getty Images)
Preventing Nuclear ‘Armageddon’
While the phrase “maximum danger” is superlative, it may still fall short of impressing the seriousness of the CCP’s growing nuclear arsenal and the role that it will play in any conflict.

The CCP’s military wing, the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), has been working tirelessly to expand and enhance the regime’s nuclear arsenal and to hold the U.S. homeland at threat.

The regime is expected to field 1,000 nuclear weapons by 2030, many of them capable of carrying multiple warheads. And it is working to field hypersonic bombardment systems apparently designed to be used as a first-strike weapon.

Such capabilities would put the United States at grave risk in a war and would present a decision-making dynamic among both militaries unseen since the Cold War.

Epoch Times Photo
General Robert Spalding (Samira Bouaou/The Epoch Times)
Retired U.S. Air Force Brig. Gen. Robert Spalding knows something about PLA decision-making.

His career has taken him to China on more than one occasion, including a stint as a defense attache in Beijing, where he negotiated with PLA officers on critical events and established contours for managing strategic competition.

When asked if the United States could win a war against China over the future of Taiwan, Spalding answers clearly and simply.

“No,” Spalding says. “The Chinese have too many weapons and they are too close to home.”

“The U.S. could not muster enough combat power to stop China.”

The United States’ ability to project power across 3,000 miles of the Pacific Ocean is sorely lacking, he says.

Sustaining a full combat force in the region all while being held at threat by the PLA’s missile and rocket forces, to say nothing of its navy, would risk nuclear escalation at every moment.

Simply put, the United States would be outmanned and outgunned by China in any Indo-Pacific conflict. Strategic nuclear weapons in such a scenario become the United States’ most clear advantage, and the world’s most clear threat.

Spalding, understandably, views the use of nuclear weapons as a no-win scenario. Still, he does consider the strengthening of the United States’ nuclear deterrent as an essential element to deter China from extending its aggression beyond Taiwan.

“The only weapons that would enable us to balance the conventional military might of China are nuclear weapons,” Spalding says. “These would give the U.S. a fighting chance, but would be devastating for the U.S., China, and the world.”

“Nevertheless, the surest way to war is to appear weak. This is why it is imperative that the U.S. project power. Today, the only way is with nuclear weapons. We don’t have time for anything else.”

To that end, Spalding says that the United States will need to immediately start transitioning critical supply chains, including pharmaceuticals and technological resources, out of China. Leaving the delivery of such items to China is a surefire way to lose any war.

“There is no time but, nevertheless, the U.S. needs to rebuild its industrial base now while we still have some level of control,” Spalding says.

He underscores that, because the United States would be stuck trying to create new supply chains for critical resources even as current supply chains through China are destroyed, deaths at home and on the front lines could ensue.

Embedded in Spalding’s view is a certain duality present among many today. On the one hand, he believes a CCP invasion is inevitable. On the other, he believes U.S. aid to Taiwan in such a war should fall short of military intervention, which he believes would risk a nuclear holocaust.

“They [the CCP] will invade at a time of their choosing,” Spalding says. “We have to prepare for the inevitable help the Taiwanese people will need.”

“If America is attacked, it will fight. That said, I believe China will not attack the U.S. directly for fear of a wider war that consumes the CCP. This and America’s nuclear weapons will prevent Armageddon if we show strength.”

Epoch Times Photo
Military personnel stand next to Harpoon A-84, anti-ship missiles and AIM-120 and AIM-9 air-to-air missiles prepared for a weapon loading drills in front of a F16V fighter jet at the Hualien Airbase in Taiwan’s southeastern Hualien county on Wednesday, Aug. 17, 2022. (AP Photo/Johnson Lai)
Defense Industrial Base ‘Not Adequately Prepared’ for War with China
Provided the United States did come to the defense of Taiwan, however, and provided it could adequately deter the PLA from launching nuclear missiles, victory would still be far from assured.

Beyond the logistical issue of supplying the front lines—that is the problem of actually getting ammo to rifles and munitions to guns across the Pacific—the United States simply does not have the stockpiles required to conduct anything other than a brief, perhaps weeks-long campaign in the Pacific.

Secretary of the Army Christine Wormuth said as much during a March 30 Senate Armed Services Committee hearing, during which she explained that the nation’s support for Ukraine is rapidly depleting its own munitions stockpiles, and that it would be years before replacement was possible.

“One of the most important things we have learned from Ukraine is the need for a more robust defense industrial base,” Wormuth said.

“We are buying at the absolute edge of defense industrial capacity right now.”

Epoch Times Photo
U.S. Army Secretary Christine Wormuth (L) and Army Chief of Staff Gen. James McConville testify during a Senate Appropriations Defense Subcommittee hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington on May 10, 2022. (Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)
To that end, Wormuth said that the Army is spending $1.5 billion on surging production of new munitions and depots to create an “organic supply base.”

Due to the complexity of the supply chains involved and the specialized nature of the equipment, however, standing up such production and procurement efforts will take years. Well beyond the 2025-2027 start date that many military officials believe a Taiwan invasion scenario could come to fruition.

“Some of the machining tools that are needed to open up new production lines are just very large, complex machines themselves that take time to fabricate and time to install,” Wormuth said.

To be sure, not all of the munitions that the United States is currently hemorrhaging in Ukraine would necessarily be useful in a fight for Taiwan.

The 155 mm rounds used by many artillery systems in Ukraine, for example, would lose their preeminence to long-range anti-ship missiles, or LRASMs.

But here again, the United States is simply not prepared for war.

Wargames demonstrate that the United States could deplete its entire arsenal of LRASMs within one single week of fighting with China, according to a January report by the Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank.

“In a major regional conflict—such as a war with China in the Taiwan Strait—the U.S. use of munitions would likely exceed the current stockpiles of the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD), leading to a problem of ‘empty bins.’”

“The problem is the U.S. has such low stockpiles for those long-range anti-ship missiles that in our wargames, in multiple iterations of the wargame, we run out [of LRASMs] in less than a week virtually every time,” report author Seth Jones said in an associated video.

“We cannot fight in that case in protracted war because we don’t have sufficient supply of munitions.”

On this issue, military procurement programs are thus far proving of little worth. Though Army leaders like Wormuth may point to renewed investments in artillery, and speak of growing the nation’s stockpiles, one critical and inconvenient fact remains.

Nearly the entirety of the U.S. military’s precision munitions is built by the private sector.

Assistant Secretary of the Army Douglas Bush spoke on the issue during a March 3 talk at the Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank.

“The broader joint view is, of course, that a fight with China will be very much a precision munitions fight,” Bush said.

To overcome that gap in manufacturing ability, he added, the U.S. Army is funneling money to private corporations to effectively subsidize precision munitions production. Supply chains are no less complicated for those entities, however, and are likewise expected to take years to become functional.

Epoch Times Photo
Military vehicles carrying DF-21D intermediate-range anti-ship ballistic missiles participate in a military parade at Tiananmen Square in Beijing on September 3, 2015. (Greg Baker/AFP via Getty Images)
A World at War
The risks of a war for Taiwan morphing into a catastrophic nuclear conflict or else depleting the United States’ arsenal of vital munitions and leaving it enfeebled in the western Pacific appear to be high.

But what if they could be overcome?

Sam Kessler is a national security and geopolitical risk analyst for North Star Support Group, an international risk advisory firm. He believes victory is possible in such a scenario, but only narrowly.

Kessler says that the war would need to be fought and won quickly to prevent nuclear escalation, retain the nation’s stockpiles, and ensure the global economy does not spiral into nothingness as the world’s two largest economies duke it out.

To do that, he says, the United States needs the support of its allies to stem the outward flow of manpower and materiel.

“Although the U.S. has significant, powerful capabilities at its disposal, a potential war over the defense of Taiwan would need to be fought and won within a short time frame,” Kessler says.

“If there is a war between the U.S. and China, the U.S. needs to have its longstanding allies involved and committed under a unified banner.”

To that end, Kessler says that the need for allies will be most prevalent in securing global supply chains, bolstering the U.S. economy, and providing critical, non-military defense and security support in domains like space and cyber.

“The risk is a long, drawn-out conflict that depletes both manpower and resources over a period that won’t be so easily replaced in a world where supply chains, logistics, and manufacturing outlets are being re-evaluated and restructured to meet changing realities,” Kessler says.

“After all, a potential war will not just be about direct fighting on the shores of Taiwan but also in other domains of warfare that greatly impact U.S. standing and power projection at home and abroad, which can also potentially impact its global partners and allies.”

Because of the technological and economic interconnectivity of the world, he says, most nations would become involved in such a war one way or another, regardless of whether they sought to remain neutral.

Kessler, therefore, suggests the creation of a multilateral coalition of the willing, not unlike the one deployed in the Gulf War.

On this point, there is one critical problem. Because the United States would be entering a war of its own volition, it would not be entitled to the benefits of NATO’s collective defense clause.

Thus, while regional allies such as Japan and Australia could well join the fight, the United States’ European partners would likely be absent in the actual fighting.

Indeed, French President Emmanuel Macron suggested as much in early April, saying that Europe must resist becoming “America’s followers” on the issue of Taiwan.

To shore up the United States’ position then, Kessler says that the nation needs to start turning up its diplomacy efforts now, in order to ensure it receives security aid and other benefits from its partners in the war.

“Sooner or later, they would likely end up being in situations where their hands are forced to declare a position on the matter,” Kessler says. “Whether war occurs or not, the U.S. needs full assurance from its longstanding partners and allies that they have their support and vice versa.”

“To make this happen requires aggressive and proactive diplomacy as well as presenting a strong and rational case for creating a coalition of the willing.”

Here again, though, the United States is not the only one with allies.

Though the CCP regime does not formally engage in NATO-style alliances, it does have a string of partners across the globe who would be either willing to engage in direct support of its war effort or otherwise pursue their own destabilizing interests while the United States was distracted.

“Alliances and partnerships are crucial to both China and the U.S but each implements them differently,” Kessler says.

“The CCP recognizes partners in the form of client states that could play a role in helping destabilize American leadership in the international system, while spearheading a multipolar system that they can lead and project influence themselves.”

The result of the CCP’s push for multipolarity is that its own partners could launch destabilizing conflicts of their own.

Epoch Times Photo
Chinese leader Xi Jinping and Russian leader Vladimir Putin make a toast during their dinner at the Kremlin in Moscow on March 21, 2023. (Pavel Byrkin, Sputnik, Kremlin Pool Photo via AP)
One report by the Center for a New American Security think tank, for example, postulates that North Korea could use a CCP invasion of Taiwan to launch its own attack on South Korea.

The problem is not limited to East Asia either.

Iran could initiate further hostilities against U.S. forces in Syria or even invade neighboring Iraq. Russia, meanwhile, could extend its hostilities from Ukraine to Moldova, or otherwise provide direct military support to China. Brazil, Nicaragua, and South Africa could all capitalize on the event to increase their ties with China and Russia while avoiding engaging in hostilities themselves.

The result would be a world at war if not a world war outright.

“Each of these nations are skilled in the distraction game and a war effort in defense of Taiwan would present them with a unique opportunity to attempt at catching the U.S. off guard to gain a victory or prize out of it,” Kessler says.

“The likelihood of such regional conflicts erupting in these areas is very high.”

He believes the extent to which each nation takes advantage of a U.S.-China war will be dependent not only on their relationship with China, but also their own capabilities, goals, and political-economic realities.

While war might suit Russia, for example, smaller economic partners like South Africa and Brazil would be more likely to engage in increased trade or sanctions busting.

The resulting effect is political chaos, and a world in which instability and disruption are the norm.

US Should ‘Hedge’ its Bets
But what if we’re getting it all wrong: if Taiwan is not the next global catastrophe waiting to happen, and if the United States can fight and win but doesn’t even need to.

Such is the perspective of former acting Defense Secretary Christopher Miller.

For Miller, the military decision-making apparatus is prone to see only what it wants to see. Everything looks like a nail to a hammer, the old saying goes.

“I know the one thing we will get wrong is we will mispredict the next major conflict,” Miller said during an April 4 talk with the CATO Institute, a libertarian think tank.

“That’s the only thing I know.”

On that note, Miller said that he worries the United States is overestimating the capabilities and expertise of the CCP regime the same way it did of Russia prior to the full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

Far from being a peer military competitor, Miller suggested that the CCP could be deploying a strategy similar to the one used by the United States to defeat the Soviet Union without overt conflict during the Cold War.

By fooling the United States into believing that war is constantly imminent the CCP could actually be goading the United States into destroying its own economy through excessive investments in major military platforms, Miller said.

“I think they’re goading us and we’re just taking it [at face value],” Miller said.

As such, Miller said that the threat to Taiwan’s continued de facto independence was a reality, but that the United States could be playing into the CCP’s plans by heavily investing in ultra-expensive, and easily targetable systems such as fighter jets and aircraft carriers.

Miller pointed instead to the four elements of national power: diplomacy, information, military, and economics.

To obtain victory against China, and to preserve greater liberty across the world, he said, the best path forward for the United States is to better leverage the non-military elements of national power.

“I believe with the Chinese threat, the way to approach that is a very subtle and indirect approach … irregular warfare,” Miller said.

“Let’s go ahead and use a little more … diplomacy, information, and economics, and let’s go ahead and back off on the military for a little while, because we have time. If we’re wrong, we can spin things up.”

When asked by the Epoch Times what advice he had for directing the nation’s military development given that a future war with China was as of yet unwritten, Miller said that the best course of action was to hedge the nation’s bets.

“If you’re a business person and you’re in an unpredictable business climate, what do you do? You hedge.”

“We can’t go all in on any one thing. We need to have a wide range of capabilities.”

To simultaneously avoid the disaster of war in Asia and defeat the regime, he said, the best weapon in the U.S. arsenal was the truth about the CCP.

By shining an unflinching light on the atrocities committed by the regime every day, and by ensuring that those atrocities were seen and understood by the Chinese people, the regime will crumble to internal pressures.

“My belief is that authoritarian, totalitarian governments fear one thing: Popular discontent and popular uprising… The thing that they fear most is not fleets of aircraft carriers, tanks, or expeditionary logistics. They fear information. And that’s one of the key components of irregular warfare.”

“Just tell the truth. It will work through it.”

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Re: ET: Looks like we would lose a war with China
« Reply #773 on: April 13, 2023, 09:23:31 AM »
By shining an unflinching light on the atrocities committed by the regime every day, and by ensuring that those atrocities were seen and understood by the Chinese American people, the regime will crumble to internal pressures.

“My belief is that authoritarian, totalitarian governments fear one thing: Popular discontent and popular uprising… The thing that they fear most is not fleets of aircraft carriers, tanks, or expeditionary logistics. They fear information. And that’s one of the key components of irregular warfare.”

“Just tell the truth. It will work through it.”


China is Preparing for War; Is the US Ready? (theepochtimes.com)
Andrew Thornebrooke
By Andrew Thornebrooke
April 12, 2023Updated: April 12, 2023
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News Analysis

The ammunition is running low, casualties are immense, medicine and other critical supplies have not come for weeks, and a nuclear attack on the American homeland is imminent.

It is a dramatic scene, more closely resembling a Hollywood drama than any war that the United States has actually fought in the last half-century. It is nevertheless what many expect a war between the United States and communist China could look like this decade.

Both the United States and China are investing record-breaking sums in building up their military capabilities. Leadership on both sides increasingly appears to consider such a conflict as inevitable, despite rhetoric to the contrary.

The cause for that mutual enmity is the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) claim that democratic Taiwan belongs to China, and CCP leader Xi Jinping’s desire to force that unification within a few years’ time.

Xi has ordered the regime’s military wing to prepare for war, and to be ready to launch an invasion of Taiwan by 2027.

Preparing for what would be history’s most ambitious amphibious assault is not the same as actually launching it. But, should the worst occur, the Biden administration or its successor will have to decide either to join the fray, or to let Taiwan stand on its own and fight for its freedom.

Before U.S. leadership decides on that question, however, it must answer another, more foundational one: Can the United States win a war with China?

‘The Window of Maximum Danger’
Rep. Mike Gallagher (R-Wisc.) is more invested in the new cold war between the United States and China than most.

Tasked with leading Congress’ new House Select Committee on Strategic Competition with the CCP, he is one of the few movers and shakers in the legislative branch directly engaged in developing an action plan to defend the American people, its economy, and values from CCP aggression.

For him, Russia’s ongoing conquest of Ukraine, and the United States’ failure to deter it, contain all the lessons necessary to prepare for what comes next in Taiwan.

“If we don’t learn the right lessons from the failure of deterrence in Ukraine, authoritarian aggression and the CCP’s malign influence will spread to the Indo-Pacific, and our New Cold War with the Chinese Communist Party could quickly become hot,” Gallagher told The Epoch Times.

“To prevent this, we have to act with a sense of urgency and do everything we can to deter a CCP invasion of Taiwan.”

That plan is much the same as it has been since 1979, when the United States passed the Taiwan Relations Act and agreed to provide the island with the arms necessary to maintain its self-defense.

The strategic landscape 44 years ago was something altogether different, however, and the number of weapons and systems that Taiwan now requires to hold the CCP at threat are immense.

The way Gallagher sees it, neither Taiwan nor the United States is prepared for the possibility of war with China.

Speaking back in November of 2021, Gallagher warned that, “if we went to war in the Taiwan Strait tomorrow, we’d probably lose.”

Gallagher is careful now to avoid similar doomspeak but, when asked if he still agreed with that assessment, his optimism for the United States’ performance in a war with China is palpably limited.

“If the Chinese Communist Party invaded Taiwan today, we would not be well positioned to defend our friend, our interests, or American values in the Indo-Pacific,” Gallagher says.

The United States must choose, he believes, to arm Taiwan to the teeth now or come to Taiwan’s aid at a much greater cost later.

Either way, the choices the United States makes now, he says, will largely determine the conditions of victory and defeat at a later date. To that end, Congress must unite to arm Taiwan and systematically counter the CCP’s malign influence at every opportunity.

“We are in the window of maximum danger,” Gallagher says, “and if we are going to ensure that it’s the U.S.—not the CCP—writing the rules of the 21st century, we need to unite in overwhelming bipartisan fashion to combat CCP aggression.”

Taiwan Holds Defence Drills
Taiwan’s armed forces hold two days of routine drills to show combat readiness ahead of Lunar New Year holidays at a military base in Kaohsiung, Taiwan, on Jan. 12, 2023. (Annabelle Chih/Getty Images)
Preventing Nuclear ‘Armageddon’
While the phrase “maximum danger” is superlative, it may still fall short of impressing the seriousness of the CCP’s growing nuclear arsenal and the role that it will play in any conflict.

The CCP’s military wing, the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), has been working tirelessly to expand and enhance the regime’s nuclear arsenal and to hold the U.S. homeland at threat.

The regime is expected to field 1,000 nuclear weapons by 2030, many of them capable of carrying multiple warheads. And it is working to field hypersonic bombardment systems apparently designed to be used as a first-strike weapon.

Such capabilities would put the United States at grave risk in a war and would present a decision-making dynamic among both militaries unseen since the Cold War.

Epoch Times Photo
General Robert Spalding (Samira Bouaou/The Epoch Times)
Retired U.S. Air Force Brig. Gen. Robert Spalding knows something about PLA decision-making.

His career has taken him to China on more than one occasion, including a stint as a defense attache in Beijing, where he negotiated with PLA officers on critical events and established contours for managing strategic competition.

When asked if the United States could win a war against China over the future of Taiwan, Spalding answers clearly and simply.

“No,” Spalding says. “The Chinese have too many weapons and they are too close to home.”

“The U.S. could not muster enough combat power to stop China.”

The United States’ ability to project power across 3,000 miles of the Pacific Ocean is sorely lacking, he says.

Sustaining a full combat force in the region all while being held at threat by the PLA’s missile and rocket forces, to say nothing of its navy, would risk nuclear escalation at every moment.

Simply put, the United States would be outmanned and outgunned by China in any Indo-Pacific conflict. Strategic nuclear weapons in such a scenario become the United States’ most clear advantage, and the world’s most clear threat.

Spalding, understandably, views the use of nuclear weapons as a no-win scenario. Still, he does consider the strengthening of the United States’ nuclear deterrent as an essential element to deter China from extending its aggression beyond Taiwan.

“The only weapons that would enable us to balance the conventional military might of China are nuclear weapons,” Spalding says. “These would give the U.S. a fighting chance, but would be devastating for the U.S., China, and the world.”

“Nevertheless, the surest way to war is to appear weak. This is why it is imperative that the U.S. project power. Today, the only way is with nuclear weapons. We don’t have time for anything else.”

To that end, Spalding says that the United States will need to immediately start transitioning critical supply chains, including pharmaceuticals and technological resources, out of China. Leaving the delivery of such items to China is a surefire way to lose any war.

“There is no time but, nevertheless, the U.S. needs to rebuild its industrial base now while we still have some level of control,” Spalding says.

He underscores that, because the United States would be stuck trying to create new supply chains for critical resources even as current supply chains through China are destroyed, deaths at home and on the front lines could ensue.

Embedded in Spalding’s view is a certain duality present among many today. On the one hand, he believes a CCP invasion is inevitable. On the other, he believes U.S. aid to Taiwan in such a war should fall short of military intervention, which he believes would risk a nuclear holocaust.

“They [the CCP] will invade at a time of their choosing,” Spalding says. “We have to prepare for the inevitable help the Taiwanese people will need.”

“If America is attacked, it will fight. That said, I believe China will not attack the U.S. directly for fear of a wider war that consumes the CCP. This and America’s nuclear weapons will prevent Armageddon if we show strength.”

Epoch Times Photo
Military personnel stand next to Harpoon A-84, anti-ship missiles and AIM-120 and AIM-9 air-to-air missiles prepared for a weapon loading drills in front of a F16V fighter jet at the Hualien Airbase in Taiwan’s southeastern Hualien county on Wednesday, Aug. 17, 2022. (AP Photo/Johnson Lai)
Defense Industrial Base ‘Not Adequately Prepared’ for War with China
Provided the United States did come to the defense of Taiwan, however, and provided it could adequately deter the PLA from launching nuclear missiles, victory would still be far from assured.

Beyond the logistical issue of supplying the front lines—that is the problem of actually getting ammo to rifles and munitions to guns across the Pacific—the United States simply does not have the stockpiles required to conduct anything other than a brief, perhaps weeks-long campaign in the Pacific.

Secretary of the Army Christine Wormuth said as much during a March 30 Senate Armed Services Committee hearing, during which she explained that the nation’s support for Ukraine is rapidly depleting its own munitions stockpiles, and that it would be years before replacement was possible.

“One of the most important things we have learned from Ukraine is the need for a more robust defense industrial base,” Wormuth said.

“We are buying at the absolute edge of defense industrial capacity right now.”

Epoch Times Photo
U.S. Army Secretary Christine Wormuth (L) and Army Chief of Staff Gen. James McConville testify during a Senate Appropriations Defense Subcommittee hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington on May 10, 2022. (Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)
To that end, Wormuth said that the Army is spending $1.5 billion on surging production of new munitions and depots to create an “organic supply base.”

Due to the complexity of the supply chains involved and the specialized nature of the equipment, however, standing up such production and procurement efforts will take years. Well beyond the 2025-2027 start date that many military officials believe a Taiwan invasion scenario could come to fruition.

“Some of the machining tools that are needed to open up new production lines are just very large, complex machines themselves that take time to fabricate and time to install,” Wormuth said.

To be sure, not all of the munitions that the United States is currently hemorrhaging in Ukraine would necessarily be useful in a fight for Taiwan.

The 155 mm rounds used by many artillery systems in Ukraine, for example, would lose their preeminence to long-range anti-ship missiles, or LRASMs.

But here again, the United States is simply not prepared for war.

Wargames demonstrate that the United States could deplete its entire arsenal of LRASMs within one single week of fighting with China, according to a January report by the Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank.

“In a major regional conflict—such as a war with China in the Taiwan Strait—the U.S. use of munitions would likely exceed the current stockpiles of the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD), leading to a problem of ‘empty bins.’”

“The problem is the U.S. has such low stockpiles for those long-range anti-ship missiles that in our wargames, in multiple iterations of the wargame, we run out [of LRASMs] in less than a week virtually every time,” report author Seth Jones said in an associated video.

“We cannot fight in that case in protracted war because we don’t have sufficient supply of munitions.”

On this issue, military procurement programs are thus far proving of little worth. Though Army leaders like Wormuth may point to renewed investments in artillery, and speak of growing the nation’s stockpiles, one critical and inconvenient fact remains.

Nearly the entirety of the U.S. military’s precision munitions is built by the private sector.

Assistant Secretary of the Army Douglas Bush spoke on the issue during a March 3 talk at the Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank.

“The broader joint view is, of course, that a fight with China will be very much a precision munitions fight,” Bush said.

To overcome that gap in manufacturing ability, he added, the U.S. Army is funneling money to private corporations to effectively subsidize precision munitions production. Supply chains are no less complicated for those entities, however, and are likewise expected to take years to become functional.

Epoch Times Photo
Military vehicles carrying DF-21D intermediate-range anti-ship ballistic missiles participate in a military parade at Tiananmen Square in Beijing on September 3, 2015. (Greg Baker/AFP via Getty Images)
A World at War
The risks of a war for Taiwan morphing into a catastrophic nuclear conflict or else depleting the United States’ arsenal of vital munitions and leaving it enfeebled in the western Pacific appear to be high.

But what if they could be overcome?

Sam Kessler is a national security and geopolitical risk analyst for North Star Support Group, an international risk advisory firm. He believes victory is possible in such a scenario, but only narrowly.

Kessler says that the war would need to be fought and won quickly to prevent nuclear escalation, retain the nation’s stockpiles, and ensure the global economy does not spiral into nothingness as the world’s two largest economies duke it out.

To do that, he says, the United States needs the support of its allies to stem the outward flow of manpower and materiel.

“Although the U.S. has significant, powerful capabilities at its disposal, a potential war over the defense of Taiwan would need to be fought and won within a short time frame,” Kessler says.

“If there is a war between the U.S. and China, the U.S. needs to have its longstanding allies involved and committed under a unified banner.”

To that end, Kessler says that the need for allies will be most prevalent in securing global supply chains, bolstering the U.S. economy, and providing critical, non-military defense and security support in domains like space and cyber.

“The risk is a long, drawn-out conflict that depletes both manpower and resources over a period that won’t be so easily replaced in a world where supply chains, logistics, and manufacturing outlets are being re-evaluated and restructured to meet changing realities,” Kessler says.

“After all, a potential war will not just be about direct fighting on the shores of Taiwan but also in other domains of warfare that greatly impact U.S. standing and power projection at home and abroad, which can also potentially impact its global partners and allies.”

Because of the technological and economic interconnectivity of the world, he says, most nations would become involved in such a war one way or another, regardless of whether they sought to remain neutral.

Kessler, therefore, suggests the creation of a multilateral coalition of the willing, not unlike the one deployed in the Gulf War.

On this point, there is one critical problem. Because the United States would be entering a war of its own volition, it would not be entitled to the benefits of NATO’s collective defense clause.

Thus, while regional allies such as Japan and Australia could well join the fight, the United States’ European partners would likely be absent in the actual fighting.

Indeed, French President Emmanuel Macron suggested as much in early April, saying that Europe must resist becoming “America’s followers” on the issue of Taiwan.

To shore up the United States’ position then, Kessler says that the nation needs to start turning up its diplomacy efforts now, in order to ensure it receives security aid and other benefits from its partners in the war.

“Sooner or later, they would likely end up being in situations where their hands are forced to declare a position on the matter,” Kessler says. “Whether war occurs or not, the U.S. needs full assurance from its longstanding partners and allies that they have their support and vice versa.”

“To make this happen requires aggressive and proactive diplomacy as well as presenting a strong and rational case for creating a coalition of the willing.”

Here again, though, the United States is not the only one with allies.

Though the CCP regime does not formally engage in NATO-style alliances, it does have a string of partners across the globe who would be either willing to engage in direct support of its war effort or otherwise pursue their own destabilizing interests while the United States was distracted.

“Alliances and partnerships are crucial to both China and the U.S but each implements them differently,” Kessler says.

“The CCP recognizes partners in the form of client states that could play a role in helping destabilize American leadership in the international system, while spearheading a multipolar system that they can lead and project influence themselves.”

The result of the CCP’s push for multipolarity is that its own partners could launch destabilizing conflicts of their own.

Epoch Times Photo
Chinese leader Xi Jinping and Russian leader Vladimir Putin make a toast during their dinner at the Kremlin in Moscow on March 21, 2023. (Pavel Byrkin, Sputnik, Kremlin Pool Photo via AP)
One report by the Center for a New American Security think tank, for example, postulates that North Korea could use a CCP invasion of Taiwan to launch its own attack on South Korea.

The problem is not limited to East Asia either.

Iran could initiate further hostilities against U.S. forces in Syria or even invade neighboring Iraq. Russia, meanwhile, could extend its hostilities from Ukraine to Moldova, or otherwise provide direct military support to China. Brazil, Nicaragua, and South Africa could all capitalize on the event to increase their ties with China and Russia while avoiding engaging in hostilities themselves.

The result would be a world at war if not a world war outright.

“Each of these nations are skilled in the distraction game and a war effort in defense of Taiwan would present them with a unique opportunity to attempt at catching the U.S. off guard to gain a victory or prize out of it,” Kessler says.

“The likelihood of such regional conflicts erupting in these areas is very high.”

He believes the extent to which each nation takes advantage of a U.S.-China war will be dependent not only on their relationship with China, but also their own capabilities, goals, and political-economic realities.

While war might suit Russia, for example, smaller economic partners like South Africa and Brazil would be more likely to engage in increased trade or sanctions busting.

The resulting effect is political chaos, and a world in which instability and disruption are the norm.

US Should ‘Hedge’ its Bets
But what if we’re getting it all wrong: if Taiwan is not the next global catastrophe waiting to happen, and if the United States can fight and win but doesn’t even need to.

Such is the perspective of former acting Defense Secretary Christopher Miller.

For Miller, the military decision-making apparatus is prone to see only what it wants to see. Everything looks like a nail to a hammer, the old saying goes.

“I know the one thing we will get wrong is we will mispredict the next major conflict,” Miller said during an April 4 talk with the CATO Institute, a libertarian think tank.

“That’s the only thing I know.”

On that note, Miller said that he worries the United States is overestimating the capabilities and expertise of the CCP regime the same way it did of Russia prior to the full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

Far from being a peer military competitor, Miller suggested that the CCP could be deploying a strategy similar to the one used by the United States to defeat the Soviet Union without overt conflict during the Cold War.

By fooling the United States into believing that war is constantly imminent the CCP could actually be goading the United States into destroying its own economy through excessive investments in major military platforms, Miller said.

“I think they’re goading us and we’re just taking it [at face value],” Miller said.

As such, Miller said that the threat to Taiwan’s continued de facto independence was a reality, but that the United States could be playing into the CCP’s plans by heavily investing in ultra-expensive, and easily targetable systems such as fighter jets and aircraft carriers.

Miller pointed instead to the four elements of national power: diplomacy, information, military, and economics.

To obtain victory against China, and to preserve greater liberty across the world, he said, the best path forward for the United States is to better leverage the non-military elements of national power.

“I believe with the Chinese threat, the way to approach that is a very subtle and indirect approach … irregular warfare,” Miller said.

“Let’s go ahead and use a little more … diplomacy, information, and economics, and let’s go ahead and back off on the military for a little while, because we have time. If we’re wrong, we can spin things up.”

When asked by the Epoch Times what advice he had for directing the nation’s military development given that a future war with China was as of yet unwritten, Miller said that the best course of action was to hedge the nation’s bets.

“If you’re a business person and you’re in an unpredictable business climate, what do you do? You hedge.”

“We can’t go all in on any one thing. We need to have a wide range of capabilities.”

To simultaneously avoid the disaster of war in Asia and defeat the regime, he said, the best weapon in the U.S. arsenal was the truth about the CCP.

By shining an unflinching light on the atrocities committed by the regime every day, and by ensuring that those atrocities were seen and understood by the Chinese people, the regime will crumble to internal pressures.

“My belief is that authoritarian, totalitarian governments fear one thing: Popular discontent and popular uprising… The thing that they fear most is not fleets of aircraft carriers, tanks, or expeditionary logistics. They fear information. And that’s one of the key components of irregular warfare.”

“Just tell the truth. It will work through it.”

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Re: WW3
« Reply #776 on: April 16, 2023, 02:39:35 PM »
"First of all, what interest does the United Kingdom have in continuing and sustaining this war? A powerful faction in Washington DC, with supporters in the West Wing of the White House, the Pentagon, the State Department and the CIA, have long wanted a proxy war with Russia."

I recall asking a Brit once what they think of US
and her response many wonder why they always have to follow what the US wants to do.
So this rings true ......

OTOH one could argue Russian aggression is a threat to other European  countries
along with Nato.

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Re: WW3
« Reply #777 on: April 16, 2023, 02:44:04 PM »
"First of all, what interest does the United Kingdom have in continuing and sustaining this war? A powerful faction in Washington DC, with supporters in the West Wing of the White House, the Pentagon, the State Department and the CIA, have long wanted a proxy war with Russia."

I recall asking a Brit once what they think of US
and her response many wonder why they always have to follow what the US wants to do.
So this rings true ......

OTOH one could argue Russian aggression is a threat to other European  countries
along with Nato.

We (The US and NATO) have been fcuking around into former Warsaw Pact/Soviet Union places for DECADES (After we promised we wouldn't) until finally we get a response and it's "OMG! PUTINHitler!"

 :roll:


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Re: WW3
« Reply #778 on: April 16, 2023, 08:24:21 PM »
Sorry, but this is partially delusional.

The totalitarian suppression of East Europe by the Soviet Empire is a matter of record, as is America's success is keeping it from rolling through West Europe as well.

Entirely a rational thought to want to prevent it from happening again.


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Re: WW3
« Reply #779 on: April 21, 2023, 06:51:51 AM »
Sorry, but this is partially delusional.

The totalitarian suppression of East Europe by the Soviet Empire is a matter of record, as is America's success is keeping it from rolling through West Europe as well.

Entirely a rational thought to want to prevent it from happening again.

1. We promised we WOULD NOT push into the former Soviet Union and of course we lied.

2. Western Europe is in much greater danger from it's 3rd world invasion and crippling "green energy" policies.

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Re: WW3
« Reply #781 on: April 22, 2023, 08:30:49 AM »
"1. We promised we WOULD NOT push into the former Soviet Union"


Ummm , , , this has been asserted , , , and quite plausibly challenged e.g. as being an oral comment only.  I would also note that that Russia SIGNED the formal agreement known as the Budapest Memorandum to respect Uke territory in 1993.  Since then it has seized Donbas and more and is in the process of turning much of Ukraine into Grozny status.


"2. Western Europe is in much greater danger from it's 3rd world invasion and crippling "green energy" policies."   

Don't know that I would say "much greater" but certainly agree to calling these "existential threats".

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https://media.gab.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=1050,quality=100,fit=scale-down/system/media_attachments/files/135/754/267/original/d293b4bf8459fd63.jpg



"I hereby inform you that the Wagner PMC commanders’ council has signed the protocol. ‘The council was attended by 427 people (quorum has been reached). The following decisions were made:

1. To consider as illegitimate government bodies of the USA, Great Britain and Canada.

We know for certain that the policy of these countries is based on the creation and use of terrorist organizations, as well as terrorist methods in the following spheres: military, economic, biological, information, telecommunications (cyberterrorism), humanitarian (resulting in various forms of genocide and neo-colonialism: the oppression of the black population of Africa, the Slavic peoples in particular, Russians, oppression of Asians on racial grounds), as well as confessional terrorism, especially towards Christians and Muslims.

2. Recognize as invalid the following documents: the US Declaration of Independence (ratified 4 July 1776), the Treaty of Union of Great Britain (ratified 1 May 1707), the Constitutional Act of British North America (adopted March 29, 1867).

Accordingly, having all the necessary information about the 2016 and 2020 US elections, as well as the documented facts of fraud during the latter, we determine the 2020 US election to be illegal. We recognize Great Britain as a state whose citizens currently live in a “troubled time of anarchy.”

We challenge the sovereignty of Canada due to the fact that it is a territory of the Commonwealth led by King Charles.

Based on the above, the governments of the United States, Great Britain and Canada are recognized as terrorist and illegal:

Clauses 4 and 9 of paragraph 7 of the Charter of PMC “Wagner” apply to the following chief terrorists.

US President Joseph Biden, King Charles III of Great Britain and Canada must give an explanation for what reason they illegitimately hold power in the above states, oppressing the peoples of the USA, Great Britain and Canada.

In turn, PMC “Wagner” will provide the peoples of these and other oppressed countries all kinds of assistance in countering the terrorist structures, such as the government of the United States, British and Canadian government, Islamic State, Al-Qaeda, Boko Haram, Katiba Masina, etc. We will protect and support the civilian population of states, that has been exposed to genocide, neo-colonialism, terrorism by private, public and supranational entities."

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Re: WW3
« Reply #783 on: April 22, 2023, 04:09:02 PM »
Asked sincerely:

How did you come to this?  Do you give it credence?  Why?

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Re: WW3
« Reply #784 on: April 22, 2023, 04:27:29 PM »
Asked sincerely:

How did you come to this?  Do you give it credence?  Why?

I don't know if it's valid, thus the header on the post. I don't have any in-house Russian translation ability, so hoping someone can help with that and verification Wagner actually wrote it.

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Re: WW3
« Reply #785 on: April 24, 2023, 09:01:14 PM »
"I don't know if it's valid, thus the header on the post."

Whoops, I failed to read for comprehension.

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Re: WW3
« Reply #786 on: April 25, 2023, 01:59:59 PM »
The Global Defense Spending Boom
Countries see a more dangerous world and are buying new weapons. The U.S. isn’t keeping pace with the threats.
By The Editorial BoardFollow
April 24, 2023 6:26 pm ET



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A tomahawk land attack missile is launched aboard the Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer USS Curtis Wilbur in Philippine Sea, May 27, 2019. PHOTO: U.S. NAVY
A report out Monday details a boom in military spending from Europe to Asia, and mark it down as the sign of a nervous world with dictators on the march. The U.S. is less prepared for this precarious moment than the official statistics suggest, and the risks of inaction are growing.

World military expenditures rose 3.7% in real terms in 2022, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, or Sipri. By far the sharpest rise in spending came from Europe (up 13%). The pity is that it took a land war on the European continent—Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine—to persuade NATO allies to spend more on their own hard power.

Lithuania’s account is up 27%. Poland’s spending increased 11%, and Warsaw is above the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s target of dedicating 2% of GDP to defense. Finland’s military spending increased 36% in 2022, the “highest year-on-year increase” since 1962, thanks in part to a decision to buy F-35 fighter jets. A warm welcome to NATO, Finns.

Meanwhile in the Pacific, Japan increased spending 5.9% in 2022 to 1.1% of GDP, which is the highest since 1960. Selling American Tomahawk cruise missiles to Tokyo will help check China. Australia and others promise to spend more in the coming years, such as the landmark deal for Sydney to acquire nuclear-powered submarines.

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Sipri notes that 39% of world military spending is done by the United States, and making the rounds is the talking point that the U.S. spends more than the next 10 countries combined. So why spend more? Lots of reasons.

One reason is that China’s $292 billion in military spending is the tip of an iceberg. Beijing’s “military-civil fusion” policy obliterates the distinction between public and private spending. The Communist Party in any crisis could command civilian fishing fleets and commercial artificial intelligence.

Beijing can also reserve its military might for the Pacific, but the U.S. doesn’t have the luxury of abandoning Europe to focus on Asia. China and Russia are a two-headed threat. Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin at least had the courtesy to make that plain as the pair clinked champagne flutes at a recent meeting.

The truth is that U.S. defense spending is flat at 3% of the economy and is failing to keep pace with the world’s threats. Americans may prefer that other countries pick up more of the tab, but some (Saudi Arabia) are increasing their own defense spending because they perceive America is in decline. That is a fast lane to a world in which more nations develop their own nuclear weapons.

Sipri says Central and Western Europe are spending on militaries at levels not seen since 1989, and the Cold War is a relevant but incomplete comparison. The difference is that China is a more formidable threat than the Soviet Union, and asymmetric technological threats are going to spread faster to more adversaries.

The U.S. victory in the Cold War wasn’t inevitable. It was the result of choices—not least building the dominant military power necessary to prevail.

Crafty_Dog

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ET: China developing satellite hijack capabilities
« Reply #787 on: April 25, 2023, 02:01:05 PM »
second

China Developing Systems to Hijack US Satellites: Leaked Pentagon Document
A Long March 7Y4 rocket carrying the Tianzhou 3 cargo ship launches from the Wenchang Space Launch Center on a mission to deliver supplies to China's Tiangong space station, in China's southern Hainan Province, on Sept. 20, 2021. (STR/AFP via Getty Images)
A Long March 7Y4 rocket carrying the Tianzhou 3 cargo ship launches from the Wenchang Space Launch Center on a mission to deliver supplies to China's Tiangong space station, in China's southern Hainan Province, on Sept. 20, 2021. (STR/AFP via Getty Images)
Andrew Thornebrooke
By Andrew Thornebrooke
April 24, 2023Updated: April 24, 2023
biggersmaller Print
China’s communist regime is likely developing cyberweapons capable of hijacking U.S. satellite systems during a war, according to newly leaked Pentagon documents.

Among the recent trove of top secret Pentagon files allegedly leaked by an Air National Guardsman this year is one document that suggests that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), which rules China as a single-party state, is “probably developing cyber-attack capabilities that will threaten Western satellite systems.”

“The [intelligence community] assesses China is developing cyber-attack capabilities to deny, exploit, and hijack satellite links and networks as part of its strategy to control information, which it considers a key warfighting domain,” the document reads.

The document was classified as top secret special intelligence and was marked to prohibit its release to foreign nationals.


The Pentagon didn’t respond by press time to a request by The Epoch Times for comment regarding the file.

The document suggests that the CCP is developing systems capable not only of knocking U.S. satellites offline but also of actually hijacking and using them toward the regime’s own ends.

“China’s ability to infiltrate a core network or mimic a specific command link could allow it to seize control of a satellite, rendering it ineffective to support communications, weapons, or intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance systems,” the document reads.

China Preparing to Attack US Satellite Systems
The leaked Pentagon document presents the latest glimpse into the CCP’s long-running attempts to develop technologies capable of attacking and defeating U.S. satellite-based infrastructure.

The regime has been developing a comprehensive arsenal of space and counterspace capabilities for years. Such capabilities would allow the CCP to target U.S. communications and GPS infrastructures, as well as its missile defense systems.

China’s research into such capabilities includes experiments with directed energy weapons, microsatellites, robotic explosives, satellite jammers, anti-satellite missiles, grabber satellites, and a comprehensive suite of cyber warfare tools.

The regime has also been testing the U.S. ability to defend its satellite.

Speaking to The Washington Post in December 2021, Gen. David Thompson, the U.S. Space Force’s first vice chief of space operations, said the CCP was launching attacks on U.S. space infrastructure “every single day.”

Those reversible attacks—in which U.S. satellite architecture or cyber systems are compromised temporarily—are largely understood to be a testing of the waters for an actual assault in the event of a war between the United States and China.

The United States, its allies, and its partners are investing heavily to deploy newer, more distributed satellite systems to mitigate the threat posed by the CCP.

Such systems will replace the nation’s heavily centralized and vulnerable satellite systems with satellite constellations consisting of hundreds or even thousands of satellites.

ccp

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Re: WW3
« Reply #788 on: April 25, 2023, 02:14:05 PM »
Biden administration public response

we seek friendly competition
no conflict

yet historians rank him and his planners fairly high

a presenter in a required class at my work giddily pointed out how some study
found ~ 21 % of gen Z now describe themselves as LBGTQ .  she was as happy as Dr. Ruth in a good mood .

friends - which topic do you think is more important to the well being of our nation.
and please don't give me an Obama line the libs like to use now more and more frequently -> "we can walk and chew gum at the same time".




Crafty_Dog

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Re: WW3
« Reply #789 on: April 25, 2023, 02:27:45 PM »


"friends - which topic do you think is more important to the well being of our nation?"

There is no way around it, the answer is BOTH.

G M

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G M

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Crafty_Dog

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Re: WW3
« Reply #793 on: May 05, 2023, 03:05:15 PM »
Getting but a tiny taste of their own medicine, the Russkis are flapping their gums with yet another nuclear saber rattle.

G M

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Re: WW3
« Reply #794 on: May 05, 2023, 03:08:16 PM »
Getting but a tiny taste of their own medicine, the Russkis are flapping their gums with yet another nuclear saber rattle.

Why such confidence that this won't escalate?

Crafty_Dog

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Re: WW3
« Reply #795 on: May 05, 2023, 03:13:42 PM »
We are all agreed that the risk of escalation is there, but we have also seen quite a bit of bluster from the Russkis as things go to shit for them too.

G M

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Re: WW3
« Reply #796 on: May 05, 2023, 03:19:39 PM »
We are all agreed that the risk of escalation is there, but we have also seen quite a bit of bluster from the Russkis as things go to shit for them too.

History is full of examples where nations miscalculate their way into war. Is the most corrupt country in eastern europe worth risking WWIII over?

Both europe and the US are being destroyed from invasion. That is what matters.

Ukraine is a shiny object.

Crafty_Dog

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Re: WW3
« Reply #797 on: May 05, 2023, 03:28:05 PM »
"Both europe and the US are being destroyed from invasion. That is what matters."


AGREED!!!!!!!!!!!!!

"Ukraine is a shiny object".

It certainly is being used as such to distract from the invasion of our country!

That said, the problem is it is also a tar baby, and just simply disengaging would have catastropic consequences as well-- which is why we should not have FAFO on Russia's border.

G M

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Re: WW3
« Reply #798 on: May 05, 2023, 03:44:08 PM »
"Both europe and the US are being destroyed from invasion. That is what matters."


AGREED!!!!!!!!!!!!!

"Ukraine is a shiny object".

It certainly is being used as such to distract from the invasion of our country!

That said, the problem is it is also a tar baby, and just simply disengaging would have catastropic consequences as well-- which is why we should not have FAFO on Russia's border.

We should not have. Then we should have cut a peace deal instead of scuttling it last year.

Russia is not a Durkadurkastan that we can bomb from afar. Russia can turn CONUS into radioactive glass.

The fight is HERE. The FOUR Horsemen will be HERE. Your children will be fighting for survival HERE.




Crafty_Dog

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Re: WW3
« Reply #799 on: May 05, 2023, 03:45:34 PM »
Link for that meme please?